We are nearly a month on now from the introduction on 6 April 2025, to the right to take neonatal care leave and pay.

Neonatal care leave has been designed to support the thousands of working parents each year whose children need neonatal care by providing them with additional paid time off to spend with their family. Previously, they would have had to use their existing statutory leave for this time, resulting in them missing out on time with their child.

To qualify for neonatal care leave, an employee will need to satisfy the following:

• the child must be born on or after 6 April 2025

• the employee must be the child’s parent and expect to have responsibility for the child’s upbringing or the mother’s partner and expect to have main responsibility for the child’s upbringing. Adoptive parents and parents following surrogacy can also be eligible for this leave

• the child must be admitted to neonatal care within 28 days, starting with the day after they are born

• neonatal care must be medical or palliative (including end of life) and must last for at least seven consecutive days.

Eligibility requirements for pay also apply.

The child must be receiving neonatal care for at least seven days before the employee can take neonatal care leave. Practically, this means that for the first seven days when the child is receiving neonatal care, the employee does not have the right to time off. However, this should not cause an issue here if the child is admitted to neonatal care leave when they are born, as the first week will be covered by the paternity leave the employee plans to take. Where this is not the case, an employer will need to think about whether they require the employee to be at work, or if they could give them some form of agreed compassionate leave or cover it with annual leave.

The period whilst the child is receiving neonatal care is called the “tier one period”. It lasts from the day the neonatal care starts and lasts until the seventh day after it stops. In the tier one period, the employee must only tell their employer before they are due to start work on the first day of their absence that they are taking leave, unless it’s not reasonably practicable for them to do so.

The employee can accrue up to 12 weeks neonatal care leave and they will need to let their employer know when they will be taking this. It does not all have to be taken whilst the child is receiving neonatal care. They could take it later, in what is known as the “tier two period”, which is the time after the tier one period ends. However, this must be taken before the end of 68 weeks after the child’s birth and it can only be taken in blocks of a week. The notice requirements are longer during the tier two period and depend on the amount of leave to be taken.

Employers should consider implementing a neonatal care leave policy and creating relevant paperwork, such as a notification form for leave during the tier two period and a letter setting out employee rights during neonatal care leave.

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